The voice is steady and certain: “Conn, sonar – I have a new contact bearing 210 Designated Sierra 2.”

“Secure ventilating.”

“Make my depth 061 feet. Dive, aye.”

“Dive, dive.”

“All main ballast tank vents are shut. All compartments report conditions normal on the dive.”

The Seawolf SSN skims along above the surface of the ocean floor off the coast of New Zealand, the mission is simply to arrive in port. Crewmembers are sick and you have to navigate to enter in a precise manner else you may violate the Arms Control Act of 1987. But your crew is sick, and negotiations have made it possible for you to pull your nuclear-driven sub into the dock in Auckland.

What may sound easy is anything but that.

Sonalysts Combat Simulations Dangerous Waters is a PC release from Battlefront.com. With a manual of Tolstoy-esque proportions (thankfully it reads well), this is a simulation that is not entered into lightly. The game has depth, and is rather involved. Casual gamers may find this way too frustrating, while those who are a little more hardcore will find this game a real challenge to learn and grow into.

The program features voice recognition and comes with Microsoft Speech 5.1.

When you first launch the program there is an initial skill level set-up. This serves as a starting point for gamers and there are two settings – novice (auto crewmen are on, and a quick weapon reload time) and advanced (auto crewmen off and realistic weapon reload time).

The program comes with a nice little feature in the options package. You can test enable various details in the graphics and see how it affects framerates. Even turning off something as simple as terrain vegetation may result in 10 more frames per second (taking it from 151 with all graphical features enabled to 161).

There are 25 missions in the single-player game from all over the world, from the African coast to the Barents Sea to an atoll in the U.S. Pacific Command, a Filipino convoy and Tokyo Harbor Cruise. The game features missions for Chinese, Russian, and U.S. forces. Each of the single player missions are rated from one to four stars.

A one-star mission tasks the USS Reuben James to proceed to an atoll in the Pacific Ocean to take radiation readings from French nuclear testing prior to the arrival of a U.N. team of investigators. A four-star mission charges the U.S. and Japan of conspiring to infringe on Russia by gaining footholds in the Kamchatka Peninsula. A task force centered around the U.S.S. Nimitz is headed the peninsula to support Japanese actions. The mission is to intercept and sink the Nimitz.  

Each mission has various ways to set up the action. You are shown which vessels are controllable, and may or may not have an option which vessels you wish to play as. There is a mission briefing, an overview of the mission location and brief description. After a briefing, you can load out either your controlled vessel. 

After the mission, you are given a score out of 300, shown how many of the objectives you completed, how many kills and/or damage you inflicted.

First, it should be noted that this game is not all that intuitive, at least not to this writer – who spent five years in Uncle Sam’s Canoe Club and was part of a nav detail. The game features numerous controllable platforms (the way that air, surface and sub-surface vessels are referred to), which include the Oliver Hazard Perry-class frigate, the MH-60R multi-mission helicopter, the P3-C Orion (a turboprop sub-hunting aircraft), the Seawolf class sub, and the Los Angeles class sub. And that’s just on the American side. There are Russian and Chinese subs as well.

While the game does have a video tutorial, the manual also provides a nice step-by-step introduction to the mechanics of gameplay.

There are several modes of play – missions, campaign, multiplayer, quick missions, and a mission editor. The latter is an in-depth way to create unique and challenging missions in any part of the world.

The game adds voice commands, which must be set up, and work rather well – if you don’t mind other people in the room think you are crazy for barking commands over and over at the PC.

While Dangerous Waters is not the easiest of games to ease into, there are ways to tailor the experience for a player’s preference. You can learn a great deal about sonar, about the principles of Target Motion Analysis, about underwater sound propagation and thermal layers, or you can just learn how to drive the sub and go play.

The graphics of this game are well designed and the F keys will allow players to jump from one station to another easily. (A multiplayer mode allows different players to exclusively control one station.) Navigation does take some getting used to, and some of the missions are timed, and some – depending on your skill – just seem to carry on longer than they should.

There are three difficulty settings, and the camera is fully rotatable, giving players a dynamic three-dimensional look at the world. The replay value of this game is immense, thanks to the missions’ editor, which cannot only give you a single-mission, but a campaign.

S.C.S. Dangerous Waters is an immersive and thoughtful game that is rife with challenge and options. Though there may be a learning curve, the game does provide players with the opportunity to take full command of various ‘platforms’ in a wide range of mission types. It looks good, and plays well. Those who remember the Jane’s lineup of sims fondly will thoroughly enjoy this title. Those who are looking for an accurate military simulation would do well to check out Dangerous Waters.

Gameplay: 8.8
The load times are incidental to the mission lengths and depth of play. The controls take some time to get on top of, but once you do, this is a solid and intelligent game. This title was initially downloaded from the Internet, and on two occasions the game stalled and locked up, and had to be restarted, but these were minor, and it did not happen off the load from the disk.

Graphics: 8.6
The graphical quality of this game is nicely done, and quite serviceable. While there are some screens that just seem like they are replicas of others, each does serve a purpose and you have to pay attention to the wealth of information that is being shown. The game uses picture-in-picture technology in default, with a map as the main window and the window showing the “live” third-person view of your vessel. This is very good stuff.

Sound: 8.2
The sounds are very well done. The radio crackles with information that makes you feel as though you are right in the vessels during the missions. The music can get a little redundant, especially if trying to create a mission.

Difficulty: Hard
Don’t like the star-rating system beside the missions fool you. This game is involved and very challenging.

Concept: 8.8
With a wealth of mission, a mission editor, voice commands and multi-station gaming, Dangerous Waters is a well-designed title. The learning curve is steep, but once you have the nuances down, this is a cerebral exercise that gives a solid workout.

Multiplayer: 8.7
The game hooks up in two ways for multiplayer – LAN or Internet. There is also a multi-station option, which allows players to be assigned to stations on a platform, either for combat against the AI or against other, similar teams of players. All in all, this is nicely done.

Overall: 8.8
S.C.S. Dangerous Waters is deep gameplay overlaid with challenge in a seemingly accurate playground of modern naval combat. While not a game for those seeking quick, jump-in-and-play gamers, the design of the game seems daunting at first, but after the steep learning curve, players will find a simulation that requires thoughtful play. This is a terrific challenge